I see three somewhat distinct pieces here:

• order - chunk the settings that go together (see Settings by category), and put the most accessible ones first — e.g. table of contents, permissions when they're setting-ized. Ideally, hide ones the user can't add/edit.
• added cue text - without having to open a setting, and ideally for each chunk rather than each setting
• improved interface within each setting (e.g. *layout above) - one easy simplification is to stop linking the sets

Type cards currently offer to add settings applied to themselves+*type. These should have pretty much the same interface, with chunking etc. Maybe in a separate, default subtab? The same could be done for right cards (anything for which |foo|+*right+*count > 1). Depending on how we improve form creation experience it may make sense to remove formatting-related settings from this interface.